The Death of My Father
by Starry Wings
Summary: This is actually my English assessment, and is a fanfiction based on the autobiography, "My Family and Other Animals", written by Gerry Durrel. As the book never mentions his Father (So the audience assumes he is dead), I thought I would write about him and his relationship with his son - Gerry. Oh and because somebody asked, the book and it's chapters are real but this isn't.


My Father was inspiring, and I still remember his death as if it were yesterday. Charismatic, electric, bright; he was like this hybrid mix of a man, but I get the sense he was torn; torn between being a good person and missing out on all the opportunities life could offer a man as magnificent as him. When he walked into a room, everybody stood up to talk to him, everybody wanted to converse with the magnetic soul that was my Father. Mother feared for losing him, feared for him loving another, but his loyalty was that of a shepherd's dog.  
He possessed mouse brown hair that lapped lightly against his pale features, much like my own, and startling green eyes that smiled with an inquisitive thought and understanding, as if he accepted you and your faults instantly. He greeted everybody in a formal way, and seemed strict to others but – as a parent – he was everything I could have wished for.  
He approached each new day with a fresh and crisp start, setting on his work overalls and optimistic attitude, and wandered in a spirited matter downstairs for his daybreak meal. He seemed one of the most cheerful men I've ever met, even if he was my father and I was very young when he was alive. Never the less, I thought of him as my world.  
He and I seemed very alike, according to Mother's comparisons. She commented once that our attitudes and zoological interests were similar. I never really knew my Father to be interested in biology and animals; however I later discovered some sketches he must have drawn himself, each capturing the nature of a new breed of animal. He was a sharp and gifted artist, which I perceived from his portraits and sketches Mother had hidden away within the house.  
Some were set near home – narrating the Bournemouth sea-front I knew so well, capturing the froth-chained sea as the waves leapt eagerly at the shore and the gulls that cried mercilessly with their shrill calls ringing like bells – and others narrated the tale of his infrequent trips around Britain. One sketch I found was detailed and elaborate, seeming to me like an artist's masterpiece. However, it seemed not that the case that his job captured that talent – a rail worker.

I often wondered what the rails were like, and I fantasised about seeing one of the steam-omitting beasts he so often told us about, until finally one evening Father agreed with Mother I was to see the filthy, smoky creatures.  
It was early when my Father woke me from my dreamy slumber, and to say the least I was agitated and annoyed, until he kindly reminded me I would meet his friends that day. We ate breakfast and departed.  
He carried me into the station, and then to the worker's quarters. Here he read some notices posted on the walls, spoke to a frightful old man and then lumbered me into the engine shed, where he told me I would meet one of his "Beauties".  
I will openly admit that the sheer size and girth of the engine startled me and took me a while to digest. When I witnessed the smoke devil move, I sheltered in horror behind my father and was withered to a whimpering, shaking mess. I'd never observed such a metallic, giant creature before and it disturbed me.  
As much as I loved and appreciated my Father for taking his time and effort to chaperon me to, through and from his workplace, the entire experience didn't seem one I would enjoy visiting again. Returning home, Mother, Larry, Leslie and Margo challenged me about every aspect and component of the day's activities. I was only able to give short and brief answers for most of the time I was hidden behind my Father, however I did provide a detailed account of the lunch break.  
Even though I despised of my horror-inflicted encounters with the steam engines, the overall day was something I would never in my whole life forget. It was one of, if not the only, day I had ever spent completely alone with my Father before his death, without the interruption of my undesirable siblings.

I remember it must have been only a couple of weeks or so after that day that we were notified of my Father's death. Another fact I would never take in. No guests were welcome for the next year or so, and were warned spitefully that we were to mourn alone and without the unwanted, sympathetic attention of visitors. Mother had it worse, and has never been ready to accept the fact that our Father was no more.  
On the day that the services approached our door, I was quite content and busy with my tutor, struggling tiresomely through some equations I had no idea how to solve. I remember there was a loud but respectful knock on our door, and as always I stayed seated and waited for Mother to answer it. I heard someone speaking to her, a man, but his voice was low and I was barely able to hear it.  
Then I remember the silence. The deathly, ashen silence.  
Uncertainly, I turned to the door to witness a tall man dressed in a black and white uniform I understood to be a police officer, standing sheepishly before my Mother. And that sight I saw was one I never want to witness again; Mother's whole body was pale, her eyes duller than ever, and she looked frozen with either fear, cold or hatred, but maybe all. She never even uttered a sound, but I remember the clear, opaque tear that rolled like a crystal down her cheek. Her mouth was half open, but then she quickly covered it with a frail hand, shaking.  
The policeman uttered something and bowed, his hat in his hand. Immediately I rushed towards mother and forgot about my maths, clinging onto her skirt with an iron grip. She looked down at me, her eyes crammed with frightening amounts of distress, loss and tears. At that moment I was too terrified by the whole event to do anything but stare. Everything slowed down.

It was a few days until I was told why the policeman had upset Mother and why Father hadn't returned home, and now I understand why every member of the family regarded me with an unusual amount of kindness and spent hours at a time alone in their room, crying.  
The incident from what I was told was quick and he suffered little, which I prefer to believe, whatever I hear. Allegedly, Father fell onto the tracks as an engine approached, and there was no time to grab him back. I was lead to believe the wind blew him over, but the bitter likelihood is that the crowd waiting for the engine pushed him there.  
Most people would think I would be too young to understand how much of a loss the news was, but I believe I was the most effected family member, besides Mother. Those who try to comfort me have no clue what I braved.  
I refused to eat until I was force fed by Margo, and my body refused to let me sleep at night, keeping me awake with undying flashbacks of the warmer times Father, the family and I shared, like his life in my time was run through again, only it wasn't real.  
As a child I grew up without a Father, and every time I saw somebody who did enjoy the comfort of one, my heart seemed to snap and crack. Even now the pain won't cease, but I have learnt that life does go on and that I can enjoy it without the presence of my Father:

Alfred C Durrel.


End file.
